Kabally Things and Bloodstone Wings
by Hale-Bopp
Summary: Willow's cousin runs away to Sunnydale. The mysterious girl teaches Willow that magic may be in her blood, and puts Giles face-to-face with his own magical past.
1. A little temporary runeage

All hail Joss Whedon, he owns these characters, the town of Sunnydale, hack, probably even the way the characters talk! So, um, yeah, just borrowing!  
  
***"Bunch of wanna-blessed-be's. Nowadays, every girl with a Henna tatoo and a spice rack thinks she's a sister to the dark ones." --Willow ***  
  
  
  
"Uh, hi?" Five seconds ago, the doorbell had rung, Willow answered. The world made sense. Now, there was a girl standing on her doorstep, a girl with fishnets and big boots who was crying so hard her dark eye makeup was all over her face.  
The girl said something indecipherable.  
"I'm sorry?"  
The girl took a deep breath. "I'm Maryn."  
Willow shook her head, drawing a blank.  
"Maryn Rosenberg. I--I--my . . ." her words faded into convulsive sobs again.  
"Oh. Oh! Come in." What was Maryn doing here? She was her father's uncle's . . . anyway, she was a cousin, but they lived in Berkley. And she was so different. The girl Willow used to know had been smart and shy, kind of, like, well, herself.  
Maryn sat down on the couch, while Willow went and got her a glass of water and a box of tissues, then sat down beside her until she calmed down.  
The girl slowly stopped crying while blackening several tissues with her definitely not waterproof eyeliner.  
"Wh--what's wrong, Maryn?"  
She sniffled a bit, then answered in a quavery voice. "He kicked me out."  
"Who?"  
"Jordy."  
"Your brother? How did he kick you out?"  
Maryn looked up, her green eyes wide. "You mean you don't know?"  
Willow shook her head.  
"Mom and Dad . . . They, um, died." She looked away. "Since I was sixteen, and Jordan was twenty, they let him be my guardian."  
"Well, that's good, right? I mean, you didn't have to go live with foster parents."  
"Wrong. Jordy . . . He doesn't like me."  
"But he's your family. That's got to mean something."  
"Family is who loves you. Jordy just wanted me to go away. He hated that Mom and Dad died, and that he was stuck with me. He said he wasn't ready for all that responsibility, that he didn't deserve to be stuck with me."  
"Oh. I'm so sorry."  
Maryn gave Willow a little smile. "At first I tried to be really good. I cleaned up when I wasn't asked, I was always home really early, and I paid attention in school."  
"So what happened? You were being good."  
"But I guess not good enough. He still . . . resented me. So then I was not-so-good. I mean, it didn't seem to matter." She paused for a moment, biting her bottom lip. "Then he . . . caught me."  
"Being not-so-good?"  
"Yeah," Maryn said quietly.  
"Oh. And then he . . . kicked you out?"  
"Yeah." It was barely a whisper. They shared a moment of silence. "So, are your parents home?"  
"No, they're out shopping. You can put your stuff in the guest room, though. I'm sure they won't mind. They always say you're their favorite cousin."  
Maryn laughed at the obvious improbability, and Willow noticed something shiny in her mouth.  
"You got your tongue pierced? Didn't that hurt?"  
Maryn just laughed again.  
  
  
  
"It was really cool. Like having a sister, except we didn't fight." Willow sat talking to Buffy and Xander in the common room.  
"Not even a pillow fight, in skimpy pajamas?" Xander asked. "Or, a tickle fight?" He reached over and tickled Willow. In her struggle to get away, her shirt scrunched up a little, revealing a little of her tummy.  
"Whoa, what's that?" Buffy asked, staring at what looked to be a tattoo like a snowflake around her navel.  
Willow looked down, like she was surprised herself. "Oh. Oh! That's a . . ."  
"Rune." Giles appeared over Buffy's shoulder.  
Xander jumped. "What's up with the Angel act?"  
"Willow, I must ask what you're doing with a Kabbalistic Rune tattooed on your navel."  
Willow pulled her shirt down quickly. "I--It's not a tattoo, it's just henna. Maryn, uh, actually, she wants to be called Adva now, she did it for me."  
"And Adva is?" Giles seemed slightly perturbed.  
Xander smiled. "The best way to cure a headache?"  
"My cousin. From Berkley."  
Buffy frowned. "Hold up. Rune? Kabbal-- kabbalis-- kabbally things? What are we all talking about?"  
"How Willow and her-- Adva are messing around with things they can't possibly understand." he walked away as the bell rang.  
  
  
  
After the next class, Willow and Buffy walked down the hall together.  
"I can't believe I let Giles see it. This is so embarrassing," Willow scrunched her face worriedly.  
"Why is it embarrassing? It's just a little temporary runeage."  
"Well, it's kind of complicated." she paused. "Okay, so it's not. Maryn and I were talking about girl stuff, you know, trying to get her mind off her parents and her brother. And we got on the topic of, well, Xander, and um . . ." Willow thought she was going to die from embarrassment. "She told me how she had been learning about Kabballah from her ex-boyfriend. Jewish Mysticism. That she might be able to help."  
"So, instead of doing each other's hair and painting your nails you gave each other witchy mystical Jewish tattoos. Perfectly understandable, Will, especially in Sunnydale." Buffy did the combination to her locker and opened it.  
Willow leaned against the lockers with her eyes on the ceiling. "It's not that simple. I think Giles got all grumpy because it's kind of like a love spell."  
Buffy slammed her locker and stared point-blank at Willow. "Love spell?"  
"No, it's not like that. It was just a little fun thing, not a big magicky thing. Runes aren't big make-people-fall-in-love-with-me things. They're just . . . like perfume. They create a little aura around you, make people notice a little more."  
"Will, how many times . . ." Buffy paused, two fingers on her temple, collecting her thoughts. "Okay, well, it hasn't caused any trouble yet, right?"  
"Right. No trouble." Willow started a little grin. "But Xander did tickle me. And imagine me in skimpy pajamas."  
Buffy shook her head and grinned. "For your sake, I hope that rune stays trouble-free. Meanwhile, if your explanation of things is on the up-and-up, Giles got seriously wiggy over practically nothing. There's something up." she shouldered her backpack, putting on her determined face. "And I'm going to find out what."  
"Ooh, can I help? I want to help."  
Buffy smiled sympathetically. "I know. But I don't think it's a good idea for you to be around Giles right now. Besides, you've got an Adva to take care of at home. She needs you more than I do right now."  
"Yeah." Willow smiled. 


	2. Very, very, worried

All hail Joss Whedon, he owns these characters, the town of Sunnydale, hack, probably even the way the characters talk! So, um, yeah, just borrowing!  
  
***"Bunch of wanna-blessed-be's. Nowadays, every girl with a Henna tatoo and a spice rack thinks she's a sister to the dark ones." --Willow ***  
  
  
Buffy frowned. She had to find out what was wrong with Giles, which involved finding out what he was thinking, which, unless the thought was disapproval, was impossible.  
"Why so concentrate-y, Buff? I think I can see the smoke coming out of your ears."  
Buffy turned to Xander. "I think something's wrong with Giles. He was all 'Grr . . . Messing with things you don't understand . . . Grr . . . Stomping away.' And that was with Willow, for goodness sake. She's the favorite."  
"Yeah, I see what you mean. Maybe he's possessed."  
Buffy rolled her eyes. "I have a feeling this funk he's in has an un-demony cause."  
"Geeze, Buff, you take all the fun out of everything. So how come Will's not in on this one?"  
Buffy swallowed. "She's uh, with Adva. I thought that was more important." She took a deep breath. "So, let's crack this mother wide open."  
They sat in silence for a moment.  
"So do you want to pretend I never said that, or should I?"  
  
  
  
Mr. and Mrs. Rosenberg had been very cool about Adva staying for a while. They had a brief conversation with Jordan which sealed that decision. So, Adva was unpacking when Willow got home and peeked into the guest room.  
"Hey, Willow."  
"Hey, Adva. What's up?"  
Adva shut a drawer. "Your parents have been really nice."  
"Yeah, they do that." Willow took a seat on the bed. There was a friendly silence. "So, um, do you do a lot of this rune stuff?"  
"Kabballah? Yeah, Sam . . . he was really into it. His parents taught him."  
"So . . . How powerful are these runes?"  
Adva sat down next to Willow. "They usually do the trick, but they're not sure-fire. If you want, I can find something more potent for you--"  
"No! No, it's okay, I was just . . . wondering about it."  
"What happened? You seem all squeamish about it now. We were having so much fun last night."  
"I . . ." Willow decided partial truth would have to do now. "A teacher saw it. He looked at me funny, asked if I was messing with the occult, blah, blah, blah." She laughed a little.  
"That's a knowledgeable teacher, recognizing the Aegishjalmur. What does he teach?"  
"He's, uh, the librarian, actually."  
  
  
  
"So, Buff, how exactly are we supposed to find out more about Giles by spying on the library door?"  
Buffy rolled her eyes, and looked back at Xander, a difficult thing to do in their scrunched up position against a door window facing the library entrance. "We have to wait for Giles to leave, then we can go in there and see what's up. If he knows we're here, he might try to cover things up, or make me train or something."  
"At any point did you try talking to him about it?"  
"If you know Giles, you'll understand why that's plan B. Or maybe C, depending on how secure his apartment's front door is."  
"Buffy!"  
"Joke." She turned back to the window as the door to the library opened. Giles was leaving with his briefcase. "Good. He's leaving for the day." She frowned. "I did want to look in his briefcase, though."  
"It looks like he's gone."  
"Yeah, let's head out." They carefully shut the door behind them and tip-toed out into the hallway, peering around the corner in the direction Giles had gone.  
"Coast is clear," Xander whispered.  
Buffy popped the lock on the double doors with her library card, then they slipped inside, locking the door behind them.  
"Look at whatever's open on the table there. I'm going to go to his office."  
"Yeah, I'll be the lookout."  
"Whatever. Everyone's gone. All you need to look for are clues for what's making Giles angry."  
Xander pouted. "Okay."  
Buffy knelt with her card in front of the office door. She sighed. "This one's not like the other one." She slipped a bobby pin out of her hair and jiggled it in the lock. It finally popped, and she stepped inside the office, looking around for open books or any clue as to what was on his mind.  
There, open on the desk was an old yearbook. In the center of one page was a picture with the caption 'Rupert and Simon". Buffy smiled at the picture of Giles as a teenager, then looked at the guy next to him. He had dark hair and glasses. She looked closer. Simon had what looked like a little tattoo peeking out from under the short sleeve of his shirt.  
She was walking to show Xander the picture when she heard him exclaim from the library. "Hey! This looks like Will's tattoo." Buffy ran and grabbed the book from him.  
"Let me see," she nervously covered up, and handed the yearbook to Xander. "Look at this."  
"Oh my God, Giles went to high school."  
"No, look at the guy he's with. His arm." Buffy closed the book she had taken and put it on the table while Xander looked at the yearbook.  
"Oh. That looks like rune to me."  
"Exactly. You know what? We should go to Willow's. Her cousin's got to know what that rune is for." Buffy was anxious to get Xander away from the book about Willow's rune. After photocopying the page, she put the yearbook back in Giles' office and locked the door. She turned around to leave, when she was stopped in her tracks.  
"What's going on?" Giles looked at the two of them expectantly.  
"We came here to wait for you. We're, uh, worried about Willow, and we wanted to talk to you about it." Buffy tried to smile sincerely as she discreetly folded and stuffed the photocopy up the back of her shirt.  
"In my office?"  
Buffy winced. So he had seen that. "I was . . . You left the light on, I was just worried about the wasted electricity."  
"You should be ashamed about all that wasted wattage, watcher."  
"Xander, do shut up." Giles put a hand to his forehead and sighed. "Assuming that I believe you, wasn't the library locked?"  
Buffy looked at the library doors and shrugged. "We just opened them. Maybe you forgot or something."  
Giles looked puzzled for a moment.  
Bustling towards the door with Xander in tow, Buffy called back an excuse. "We really have to get going, now, though. We're supposed to meet Willow."  
"Who we're really worried about," Xander added, falsely grave.  
"Yes, very, very worried." Buffy pushed the door open and they ran down the hall and through the front doors of the school.  
  
  
  
Buffy made Xander take Adva to get snacks so that she and Willow could talk slayer. She showed the folded copy to Willow.  
"Do you think Adva would know about that tattoo?"  
"I don't know about the tattoo, but I'd be more concerned about the necklace."  
"The bat thing? I thought that looked like tacky Halloween junk."  
Willow squinted at the copy. "It's hard to tell in black and white, but do you see how it's kind of medium-dark with darker streaks?"  
"Um, kind of."  
"I think it's bloodstone. And bloodstone in a bat shape is said to have special powers."  
"Like what? Supersonic radar?"  
"More like the power to control demons. I think vampires, mostly."  
"Are you serious about this bat thing? I mean, if it works, then what am I doing? Why can't Giles just carve up some bloodstone and I can make them all work for charities or something."  
"I don't know exactly, but it's dark arts stuff. I'll have to do more research on it. But chances are that it's trouble. I mean, most dark power has some negative consequence. And my guess is that something bad happened to this guy, and that's why Giles doesn't like the runes."  
"So in some weird subconscious way he's just protecting you."  
"Yeah, I think so."  
"Well, that's all overly protective and fatherly. And kinda nice."  
Xander and Adva returned. "Who wants snack cakes?"  
Buffy started at the sight of Giles behind them. "Well, look what the Xander dragged in."  
"Giles!" Willow sat up and nervously straightened the blankets.  
Adva turned around to see what they were talking about.  
"You two left the library rather, oh . . . that's quite disconcerting."  
Buffy looked around. "What?"  
"Willow, your cousin . . ."  
"Adva," she supplied.  
"She looks just like someone I knew back in England. In high school, actually."  
"Hey, someone you knew, or someone you knew?" Xander waggled an eyebrow.  
"Xander!" Willow admonished.  
"Anyway, I couldn't help but notice how quickly you two left the library, and I couldn't help but worry."  
Xander started to stammer when Giles noticed the photocopy on the bed.  
"What's this?" He picked it up.  
Buffy smiled weakly. "Uh, a surprise?"  
Giles raised an eyebrow.  
"All right, fine, I'll tell you what's going on, but you're not going to like it. After you yelled at Willow in the common room, she got really upset. And then I was thinking and, um, Xander was there, and we were like, being mean to Willow isn't very Gilesy. So then I thought there might be something wrong, and so me and Xander broke into your office and photocopied your yearbook." She thought for a moment, then said gravely, "Because we were very, very worried."  
Giles looked exasperated. "Like you were about Willow?"  
"No, that was a lie," Xander said, trying to be helpful.  
Giles looked at Adva, then back at Buffy. "Well, I can't say I'm not disappointed in you for invading my privacy like that."  
"But you're glad we were concerned?" Xander patted Giles' arm hopefully.  
"Not exactly." Giles glanced again at Adva, growing more flustered. "I . . . Uh . . . I'm sorry I upset you Willow, it's just . . . I . . . I'll be going now." He left.  
Adva watched him go. "Did he make anyone else really uncomfortable?"  
Willow smiled at her cousin. "You just made him remember something, that's all. He can be a little nervous when he sees something he doesn't expect."  
"Because he always knows what's going to happen," Buffy interrupted.  
Adva sighed. "All I know is that that was one big creepy experience."  
"And all I know is that your freakishly familiar face got me and the Buffster out of major trouble." Xander flopped back down on the bed, picking the photocopy back up and unfolding it.  
Behind him, Adva's eyes got big. "Shit!"  
"What?"  
"That guy . . . no wonder he freaked . . . that's . . . me!" 


End file.
